The Roughest Day
by nebroadwe
Summary: Running away from the unsettled life of an evacuee, Sierra stumbles into the secret war that destroyed Jasper. Season 3 AU.
1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**_ This story was inspired by two dangling plot participles from season two of _Transformers Prime:_ Sierra's reintroduction in the opener and the evacuation of Jasper in the finale. It was first conceived after the season 3 episode "Project Predacon" but before the full scope of that arc became clear. Though now completely AU, it remains, I hope, a plausible and enjoyable might-have-been._

* * *

She bears down on the strut with all her weight and will, but it's not enough. The boulder under which it's jammed merely teeters back and forth, taunting her with its stability. She lets up, gasping, then throws herself against the lever once more. Her hands smart where the fluorescent blue liquid oozing from its torn end has soaked through the jacket she wrapped around it and her ears ring with the din of battle rising out of the gorge below: reports as loud as cannon fire and the crash of metal into metal like a fifteen — no, five hundred car pile-up on the highway.

She's running out of time to make this work.

Panic chews at her nerves. Damn it, she has a fulcrum and a place to stand and it's not the world she needs to move, just this one huge, heavy, dirty, _stupid_ rock! She heaves at it again, teeth gritted together, breath whistling in her nose, and feels the strut bow slightly under the strain.

The boulder has to move. It has to.

Because if it doesn't, she's dead.


	2. Going, Going

_Come what, come may,  
Time and the hour runs through the roughest day._

— William Shakespeare, _Macbeth_

* * *

_"Road Runner! The coyote's after you! Road Runner! If he catches you, you're through!"_

Sierra dropped into a straddle split and threw her hands above her head, lips curving in a bright smile even as dread crept up her spine. _That was_ so _off._ To her right Melody was rock-solid in her own final pose, as always, but at her left Emma had finished half a beat behind the music, a guaranteed deduction. And that wasn't the only mistake — the whole routine had been riddled with small errors: balance checks, form breaks ... _Coach is going to skin us alive._

Ms. Johannsen eyeballed the formation for a harrowing sliver of eternity, then blew her whistle. Sierra pulled her legs around to sit Indian-style as everyone else relaxed, stretching or bouncing in place or, in Manuela's case, dropping to the ground from Tyler's hold while he grumbled about her weight. Sierra reached back and poked his shin with a fingernail; Tyler yelped. "Shut it," she muttered out of the side of her mouth. "God, you're such a baby."

"Listen up, people," Ms. Johannsen said, her voice firmly suppressing any further byplay. "Good enthusiasm, good energy, but your synch needs serious improvement. Most of you are still thinking about what you're doing. I want everyone to have that choreography burned into their nerve endings by next week so you can stop thinking and start moving." She checked her watch. "Okay, that's a wrap. Cool-down stretches; then everybody hit the showers."

_That's it?_ Sierra almost missed her cue, but Melody offered her a hand up and she took it, hiding her confusion. _Thank you, Mel._ "All right, everyone," she said. "Roadrunners on three!"

The cheer squad gathered about her, palm after palm slapping down on her extended fist. She grinned around the circle and if the expression was toothier than usual, they knew the reason why. Or should. "One, two, three — "

_"Roadrunners!"_ they shouted with impressive volume — more impressive than their dance skills, certainly. _Except for me and Mel and Manuela and Ashley._ The circle broke up into chattering groups, Sierra settling in beside Melody slightly apart from the others. Her left hamstring twinged a petulant complaint and she grimaced. _ Took that last split down a bit fast,_ she thought as she carefully flexed the muscle. _ Gotta work on my control._

"Dodged a bullet there, huh?" Melody asked quietly.

"Nothing like last year," Sierra replied, finally putting her finger on what had bothered her. Last year Coach Jo would have been kicking ass and taking names over the squad's clumsiness, not commending its enthusiasm. _You get no points for participation, people — only for excellence!_ Last year the Memorial High Roadrunners had missed the cut for nationals by a whisker and spent the rest of the winter ruthlessly re-drilling the basics. Up until three months ago Sierra had been coming home from every practice with her body wrung out like a washcloth but her mind brimming with the knowledge that this time, this year, they had a real shot at making it, maybe even placing in the top ten.

But that was before they'd lost Rita and Carlos and Reyna and Deanna.

Oh, and Memorial High, as well as the rest of Jasper, Nevada.

_Before a meteor shower turned us all into refugees._

But it didn't pay to think about things you couldn't help, like space rocks raining down on your hometown and pounding everything into radioactive rubble. You had to focus on what you could do, not what you couldn't, like the Red Cross counselors said. _I can't rebuild our house, but I can rebuild the cheer squad._ So she would, even if it meant playing drill sergeant while Ms. Johannsen looked the other way.

"Coach doesn't want to scare off the newbies, I guess," said Melody.

Sierra shrugged and switched her attention to her quads. Her dad said that there were two kinds of people in every disaster: the ones who ran screaming for the nearest exit and the ones who kept their heads and tried to hold things together. Sierra had to admit that Coach Jo, like most of the teachers at Memorial High, fell into the second group. School had been one of the first things emergency management had gotten up and running after the evacuation: the National Guard had trucked in a set of converted shipping containers to use as classrooms and even laid down Astroturf and Tartan track under a big inflatable dome for phys ed. But not everyone who'd stayed was equally good at keeping their cool. "Some of them could use a good scare," Sierra said. "If Tyler doesn't let up on Manuela ... "

"He'll get over it," said Melody, adding with a giggle, "He just needs to put some muscle on those chick-chick-chicken wings of his."

"I am _not_ losing anyone else decent off this team!" That came out harsher than she'd intended and Melody flinched. "Sorry," Sierra said immediately. God knew it was absolutely unfair to take her irritation out on her best friend since fifth grade, the one friend of all her friends who'd never, ever, ever let her down. "I hear Tyler's dad went to the NVMA job fair," she went on, "so maybe the problem will just ... go away."

Melody nodded and ducked her head between her extended arms as she rounded her back. Sierra bit her lip. _I said sorry!_ Okay, so neither of them was a miner's kid, waiting to see whether Erdcom would get permission to reopen operations now that the dust had settled or whether they'd have to move somewhere else, like Carlos and Reyna's family had. Melody's dad was teaching third grade in one of the more colorful shipping containers and her mom was a software development consultant who worked from home — they were doing fine right here. And her own dad, a lawyer, had almost more business than he could handle helping people get their lives sorted out. _We're lucky, so we have to take the lead in keeping things normal for everyone else._ She glanced over at the pair of PortaKleen trailers on the far side of the field. "You want the long shower?" she offered.

Melody straightened. "No, thanks," she said, smiling, and Sierra let out a covert sigh of relief. "I need to talk to Coach Jo for a minute."

"Sure," answered Sierra. She exchanged high-fives with Melody, then grabbed her gym bag and jogged over to the girls' trailer.

Rank, Sierra's dad also liked to say, had its responsibilities as well as its privileges. These days Sierra cheerfully shouldered her every responsibility as squad captain in return for the privilege of a decent shower. The PortaKleen's stalls, though small, were queen-sized compared to the toothpaste tube in the trailer her family currently called home. The hot water taps actually ran hot and the boiler was large enough to ensure that no one, not even the poor nerds pushed to the end of the line after gym class, had to freeze. Best of all, she could take her time: nobody hounded a captain out of her stall to make room for the plebes rushing through their ablutions to catch the late bus. Sierra tilted her head back, eyes closed, and let the spray play over her face. _Bliss._ She shut the water off while she soaped up, but rinsed herself and her long auburn hair extra-thoroughly afterward. _Thank you, God._

Melody was already drying her own blonde bob in front of the mirror when Sierra pushed the curtain of the stall's dressing area aside. They did their make-up together, checking each other's work as always. Sierra dimpled experimentally at her slightly underlit reflection, then added a touch more blush to her cheeks. "Like so?" she asked.

"Mm-hmm," approved Melody, adding with a wicked smirk, "The face that launched a thousand street races."

Sierra rolled her eyes. "Make that Memorial High's quest for the state championship."

"Uh-huh," said Melody, an uncharacteristically cynical lilt to her voice. "That's ... going to take more than a good game face." She avoided Sierra's gaze in the mirror as the other girl tried to catch her eye.

Sierra sighed. She couldn't really disagree. But you had to believe in the dream first or you'd never get anywhere. And it helped immensely to look the part you were playing. A game face involved more than powder and glitter; it had to project warmth to spectators and confidence to competitors, support for teammates and poise for judges, all while appearing natural, cheerful and, oh yes, cute. Sierra had spent the past six years perfecting hers — not just the full-on competition version, either, but a set of lower power variants for use on teachers, classmates, salesclerks, security guards ... pretty much everyone, actually, except her family and Mel. Unless, that is, she was wheedling permission for a late night out from her parents or making excuses for missing curfew, which was a lot harder than inspiring her squad or impressing a finicky judge or keeping desperate wannabes in their place.

Melody linked arms with her as they crossed the parking lot to the bus stop, gym bags swinging heavily from their shoulders. The graveled space was largely empty except for the line of late buses and a few cars, most belonging to teachers but several to students. Coach Jo waved at them from her convertible before peeling out in a scatter of pebbles and red dust that earned her the derisive laughter of the too-cool-for-school crowd lounging across the way. Sierra primmed her mouth. "Hardly the behavior we expect of a role model!" she exclaimed in a nasal, grandmotherly voice.

Melody snorted, then elbowed her in the ribs. "Heads up — incoming."

A flame-detailed black coupe purred up beside them and Mr. Too-Cool-For-School himself, Vince, leaned out the driver's side window, red hair artfully mussed, teeth gleaming in a broad smile. "Ladies," he said expansively, keeping pace with them as they walked. "Going my way?"

_Obviously, _Sierra thought as Melody giggled. _What a lame pick-up line._ "Sorry," she said without meaning it. "We're catching the bus today."

Vince cast a contemptuous eye at the buses. "You? The shining stars of the cheer squad? Please." He hit the brakes and Melody stopped, too, leaving Sierra no choice but to listen to the rest of his invitation. "Only losers take the bus. You two are _winners."_

Melody preened, flipping her hair back, but looked to Sierra for her cue. _Thank God._ She pinned Vince with a competition-grade smile and answered, "Oh, thanks, Vince, but I don't think there's room for both of us and all our stuff in the back seat." She patted her gym bag ingenuously.

Vince's smugness decreased by at least half as he spotted the trap. It was one thing for two girls to sort themselves into front seat and back seat, but another thing entirely for them to make him pick one to take the place beside him. _Gotcha!_ Sierra thought and pulled Melody toward the buses. "C'mon, Mel, we don't want to be late."

Vince, thankfully, didn't follow, but called after them, "Any time you want to ride like a champ, Sierra, you know who to buzz." He smirked. "You have my number."

_Do I ever,_ thought Sierra, skin crawling. _And your cell, too._ She'd scored it back when she'd thought street racing was the coolest thing in the history of ever, before the crowd had gotten too rough and her parents had tightened her curfew — and, sadly, before she'd recognized Vince, the self-styled king of the pavement, for the swaggering ass he was. She offered him a Queen Elizabeth wave and strode off, her exit only slightly hampered by Melody's foot-dragging. "See you later!" her friend shouted over her shoulder.

"Mel!" Sierra exclaimed once they were safely out of earshot. "Really?"

"What?" Melody took in Sierra's disgusted expression and huffed. "Oh, come on, Sierra. Vince isn't that bad." She grinned mischievously. "And you always said he had a sweet set of wheels."

"There's more to life than wheels," Sierra replied loftily. "He's a goon."

Melody shrugged. "All boys are goons. Oh, excuse me — all except for Jack Da — "

"Mel," Sierra said again, this time putting a warning into her tone.

"Oops, my bad," Melody mock-apologized, her own voice gone merrily malicious. "Obviously a sensitive topic."

Sierra stuck her nose in the air, refusing to be drawn further. So she'd ridden with Jack Darby once and let him copy her chemistry homework a few times. He'd seemed nice. And interested. But he'd never followed up, never come to parties or asked her out, and after seeing his motorcyclist "friend" she could guess why. That had been that, even before the meteor strike. And afterwards he was just gone, like so many others — Sierra had heard that his mom, the nurse, was helping the military with disaster relief or something. _Nice work if you can get it, I guess._

She and Melody mounted the steps into the bus and took a seat two-thirds of the way back, dumping their bags and backpacks onto the bench across the aisle. The diesel ground into motion with a lurch; Melody pushed the window shut to keep the dust out of their faces. "Sierra," she said. "I need to tell you something."

"What?"

"I — " Melody's knees bumped Sierra's as she wriggled sideways to face her. "We're leaving. Moving. My mom — one of her clients offered her a job."

Sierra's breath caught. "Wow, that's — " She couldn't think of an adjective. "Which client?"

"ThoughtWorks. In Chicago."

Plenty of people had wasted time panicking when the Humvees rolled through Jasper broadcasting the evacuation order. But Sierra's dad had simply tossed everyone's go-bags into the trunk while her mom tricked the cat into his carrier and Sierra and her brother Danny grabbed the stuffed animals and video games and snacks they absolutely couldn't live without. Their car had practically led the exodus to the tent city the National Guard had conjured out of nowhere behind the mall in Gillette. It had been an adventure, like pioneering but with electricity, right up until the moment they'd learned that Jasper was gone. _Gone._ Sierra remembered how the word had seemed to echo inside her head. _Going, going ..._ "Chicago?" she heard herself say. "When?"

"Next month." Melody took her hands, squeezing hard; Sierra managed not to wince. "My dad will stay here to finish out the school year, but my mom's taking the rest of us with her. We're going to live someplace called Tinley Park; she says it's real cute and friendly."

Sierra freed her right arm from Melody's grip and wrapped it around her friend's waist. "Well, at least that gives us time to plan you a proper good-bye party," she said.

"Sierra — " Melody's voice wobbled.

"I mean it!" Sierra insisted. "We had one for Rita and she only moved to Gillette." She hugged Melody gently as the other girl sniffled. "We can't just let you ... disappear off to Chicago."

Leaning into the hug, Melody blinked back tears. "We'll Skype," she promised. "And you can come and visit. I've seen pictures of our new condo — it's got a pool and everything."

"Sure," Sierra answered. The word lacked conviction; she sat up straight, pulling Melody with her, and placed both hands on her friend's shoulders. "Just one thing, Melody Harper," she went on, staring her straight in the eye. "If you join another cheer squad, don't think I won't be out to kick your sorry butt at Nationals."

Melody hiccuped out a chuckle. "Bitch," she said, resting her forehead against Sierra's.

"That's _Captain_ Bitch," Sierra corrected. "And don't you forget it."

"Never," Melody whispered.

They sat close together, saying nothing, until the bus pulled up to a tall, black-bordered white sign marked "A." Sierra hugged Melody once more before disembarking and stood beside the signpost until the bus, and with it her best friend's wildly waving hand, turned a corner out of sight.

_Going, going, gone._

Sierra settled her backpack on her shoulders, picked up her gym bag, and turned for home. After a week or so in the tents, everyone who couldn't or wouldn't leave had been moved into trailers on government land about twenty minutes' drive west of Gillette. By now small personal touches distinguished most of them: a string of white or colored lights framing the front door, a wind chime made from orange juice can lids hanging from a window, a tiny garden in which four o'clocks and scarlet columbine bloomed. Some doubled as quasi-legal storefronts, like the Ramirezes' _agua fresca_ stand or the Kowalski brothers' home repair service. But more than a few simply sat empty, gathering dust and, lately, graffiti. Someone had spray-painted AREA 51 and THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE in bright red letters on the one at the end of Sierra's block. Her mom had complained to the mayor's office about it, but so far nothing had been done.

_Wow, what a surprise._

Sierra trudged cross-lots to shorten the walk, ignoring the tinny belling of the Smiths' chihuahua as she trespassed by his window. She'd ask Manuela to help her and her mom plan the party — that is, if her mom could get past the fact that it was yet another farewell bash. _Everyone's going to leave eventually,_ she'd said last time, her voice tired and sharp. _Won't you get partied out?_ But she'd come around after Sierra had pleaded a captain's responsibility to her squad and with her help the team had thrown as classy a send-off for Deanna as they had for Carlos and Reyna and Rita. _Besides, this is Mel_, Sierra thought. _We've known each other forever. Mom likes her. She's practically family._

She made for the trailer's back door, keeping to the path her dad had laid out between the carefully-tended beds of grass seed he was trying to cultivate into a lawn. From the kitchen window, open to the warm spring air, seeped the garlic- and basil-tinted fragrance of pasta sauce and the less appetizing sound of raised voices. Sierra paused. Things had been a little tense at home lately and she wasn't quite sure why. Her mom and dad almost never argued in front of her or Danny, but they'd been shorter with each other than usual. Creeping under the window to listen, Sierra heard her dad say, "We'd be giving up everything we built here."

"News flash, honey," her mom replied with a breathy chuckle. "Most of it's already gone — the house, your job — "

"I still have work," her dad interrupted.

Her mom chuckled again; this time the sound had no humor in it at all. "Eighty percent _pro bono_."

In the momentary silence that followed her dad didn't dispute it. Sierra frowned. She'd heard at school that he was taking people's cases for free and she'd been proud of him, but she hadn't thought he'd lost so many paying clients. "People need help," her dad said. "And I'm developing some influential contacts at the state level — "

"Contacts don't buy food," her mom said, "or pay for health insurance or put gas in the car. We're burning through our savings. We need to salvage what we can and get out, before we really have lost everything."

A breeze, too light to raise any dust, disturbed Sierra's hair. _Lose everything? What does that mean?_ She dashed the straying strands from her face and pressed her shoulder against the trailer's siding. "Not yet," her dad replied calmly. "It's only been three months. We agreed we were good for at least six."

"And then what?" asked her mom.

"We'll see where things stand," said her dad, even more calmly. Sierra knew that tone well: it was the _I am rational; your argument is invalid_ voice he used to shut down debates over everything from bedtimes to politics. "Erdcom has an enormous financial stake in seeing the mines reopened if they can do so at all safely. They've been lobbying the BMRR to get inspectors on site as soon as possible. There's an excellent chance operations will resume by the end of the year — "

" — and Erdcom will surprise us all with a company town for Christmas?" her mom broke in with withering sarcasm. There was another uncomfortable hitch in the conversation before she sighed and went on, "Caro called this morning."

"Did she."

"She wanted me to know that she and Lou would still be happy to have us."

"Too kind."

"Damn you, Pat!" her mom exploded and Sierra jerked away from the trailer wall. "She's my sister! She cares and she's worried about us, as well she should be!" Her shoes creaked across the kitchen floor, toward the window, and when she spoke again, it was in the cold, level timbre with which she counted to three before handing out a punishment. "You don't have to come if you're too busy. Sierra, Danny and I can make the trip just fine on our own."

"Helen, you're not —" Her dad's voice cut off and his shocked pause slowly lengthened into an oppressive hush.

Sierra's own breath caught hard, as if she'd taken a trust fall and someone had missed their hold. Her thoughts tumbled over each other: were they really leaving? would her dad stay behind? would anybody ask her or Danny what they wanted? what would she say if they did? what about the team? would things just keep falling apart until there really was nothing left? Her knees folded and she collapsed into a crouch, one hand clamped over her mouth to prevent the sick feeling in her stomach from escaping. _What's going to happen? Are my parents splitting up?_

"No, we won't go," said her mother, each word as heavy and slow as a semi climbing a steep grade. "Not yet. —Don't touch me."

Her father's footsteps retreated. Sierra heard the clank of a spoon against the side of the sauce pot and a small sound, a harsh exhalation that might have been a laugh or a sob. She hugged her shins, then deliberately focused on her own breathing in one of Coach Jo's relaxation exercises. _In through the nose — one, two, three, four — and hold for four — and out through the mouth for eight. Again._ After the three cycles the tension dropped away, as it always did, but she kept going until her head felt light and she tottered a little in place. _Okay. Okay._

Rising carefully to her feet, she picked up her gym bag. Her mom was setting the table now; Sierra could hear the rattle of cutlery being removed from its drawer. The front door slammed distantly as Danny stomped in with his usual greeting of _Hey, what's for dinner? —_ perfect cover for her own entrance. Sierra cracked her neck and straightened her back, pulling her mouth into a smile as she reached for the doorknob —

— and froze as she realized what she was doing.

She was putting on her game face.

She'd been putting on her game face _to go home._

Gym bag banging against her thighs, Sierra whirled and ran back down the path and through the neighbors' yards until she reached the AREA 51 trailer. Beyond lay nothing but rocks and sagebrush all the way to the eastern horizon, where low hills thrust up brown and green to meet the cloud-streaked sky. Sierra sank down in the trailer's shadow, her gut churning not with nausea now, but with anger — at Mel for leaving, at her dad for staying, at her mom for threatening him, at everyone for making her go to school and practice and parties as if nothing were wrong. _I hate this! I hate it, I hate it, I hate it!_ She was tired of holding everything together with a smile and a can-do attitude. She was sick of pretending to be fine. Her hands were shaking; she clasped them together and pressed her thumbs against the bridge of her nose. _I can't fake it anymore. I can't ..._

The breeze, growing stronger as the sun sank, hissed in the sagebrush; as if in answer, Sierra's phone buzzed. She fumbled it out of her jacket pocket to see a text message from Danny: _Dinnertime mom says where r u?_

She hesitated, then replied, _Gone to mall. Back late._ She'd catch hell from her mom for skipping supper without warning and from her dad for lying about where she was, if he ever found out. But she couldn't go home right now. Maybe she could spend the evening at Ashley's ... or maybe ...

Maybe she could just leave, too.

Sierra's skin flushed hot, then chilled into gooseflesh as the idea seized possession of her brain. What if she took Aunt Caro up on her offer? She had toiletries and a change of clothes in her gym bag and Greyhound had a stop and a ticket office at the mall. Could she still catch a bus out of Gillette tonight? She pulled up the Greyhound website on her phone. _Aha! 7:05 p.m. to Las Vegas, yes!_ And she could make the last departure from there to Carson City, where Aunt Caro and Uncle Lou lived, easily. The trick would be getting to Gillette. Sierra checked her watch. If she left now, she'd have just enough time to buy her ticket and snatch a bite to eat, but she'd need a ride to the mall from someone she could trust ... or someone she could ditch.

Heart beating faster, Sierra grinned and pulled up her contacts list, scrolling down until she found Vince's number. _Hey champ_, she texted him. _Engine still warm?_


	3. Detour

The bus jounced over a seam in the tarmac, dislodging Sierra's left earbud and waking her from an uncomfortable doze. She hastily replaced the bud; though she'd turned her phone off hours ago, it remained her first line of defense against creepers and busybodies. Only the most obnoxious persisted when she pretended not to hear them and even they gave up when she responded with shouts of _What?_ and complete misunderstandings. Sierra yawned behind her hand. She wished she could cue up one of her playlists, but then she'd also have to take notice of all the unanswered texts and voicemails her parents must have left over the past several hours. It wasn't much of a sop to her conscience, but at least she'd be able to say _I didn't have my phone on_ when she finally called home from Grammy and Grampy's.

That had been her first change of plan. She'd shaken Vince off easily at the mall food court: _I just need to wash up,_ she'd said, handing him her tray before strolling into the ladies' room by the nearer of its two entrances and out again by the other. Mr. _Don't-Be-Long-Babe_ hadn't even been watching for her return, she'd noticed sardonically, his attention caught instead by the advertisements in the window of the GameStop across the way. Counting on them to keep him anchored at the table with her cooling burger and fries until she was long gone, Sierra had extracted as much money as she could from an ATM, bought some power bars and bottled water at CVS, and hurried over to the Greyhound kiosk. But there the words _One way to Carson City, please,_ so carefully rehearsed, had stuck in her throat. It felt too much like taking sides — and what if her mom followed her out to Aunt Caro's and stayed? But Grammy and Grampy were her dad's parents; they'd retired to Orem, Utah, a few years ago and were always glad to see her when she visited. So she'd bought a ticket to the nearest stop, in Provo, and hoped that this time her grandparents would be, if not pleased, at least sympathetic enough to let her stay a while.

_I can't go back. Not right away._

Sierra reached into the backpack slumped beside her, wincing as the movement revealed a kink in her neck, and rummaged until she found a power bar. She hadn't been able to maintain a personal space buffer on the crowded bus from Gillette, but fortunately her seatmate had been a middle-aged Native American woman who'd snored through most of the trip. Sierra gnawed on the chocolate-chip-laced granola with a grimace. At the time she'd been unable to appreciate her luck, but half an hour in the dingy Las Vegas Greyhound terminal had taught her to recall the woman's borderline sleep apnea with something like nostalgia. Traveling to Provo rather than Carson City meant that instead of a twenty-minute break between connections, she'd had over ninety to kill. And no matter where she'd gone in the waiting area, within minutes someone had sidled up to offer her their "help" — directions, a snack or drink, a room for the night — or simply the dubious pleasure of their company. Sierra had never felt like such a skeeve magnet. Her game face had been worn down to a _fuck-off-and-die_ snarl by the time her departure had been called and she'd claimed a seat for her backpack without a care for anyone's convenience but her own.

Thank God the red-eye to Salt Lake City wasn't a popular route. There'd been plenty of empty places even after several families toting groggy children, a pair of dark-suited Mormon missionaries, some cowboy types in boots and well-worn hats, and a slightly louder and flashier version of the working-class crowd Sierra had ridden with from Gillette had boarded the bus. Against their T-shirts, jeans and tattoos, however, her skirt and sweater set and carefully retouched make-up stood out like a Barbie doll in a toy chest full of action figures. She'd made sure to sit across the aisle from the missionaries, but they, along with the chattiest of the boots- and jeans-wearers and all but one of the families, had disembarked at St. George about halfway through the trip. Everyone who remained, as well as the few passengers who'd boarded since, had either immersed themselves in their cell phones or reclined their seats and slept, and Sierra's own hyperalertness had given way at last to uneasy exhaustion.

She'd drowsed and wakened in spurts, face turned to the window. The night had been fine and clear, though there was little to see along the interstate but a last-quarter moon and the dim shapes of mountains, sometimes near, sometimes well distant, some as blunt-topped as Nevada buttes, others rearing up in jagged peaks beneath a spangling of stars. In the empty country between exits the lights of truck stops and small towns occasionally flashed past; across the median southbound traffic was sparse, mostly tractor-trailers. Sierra had counted them like sheep to keep regret at bay, bolstering her resolve between naps by replaying Mel's good-bye and her parents' argument before her mind's eye.

She crumpled the power bar's wrapper and stretched, yawning again. Her ears popped. The last time she'd noticed where they were it had still been deep night and the bus was passing someplace called Paragonah. Now the moon hung almost directly above in a sky more blue than black as dawn struggled to overtop the eastern face of the mountains closing in on either side of the highway. Sierra pushed back her jacket sleeve to look at her watch: two hours more to Provo. She drummed her fingers on the buckle of her seat belt. Most of her fellow passengers were still sleeping; maybe this would be a good time to use the restroom, if it wasn't too awful —

The bus swerved left, then right, sharply enough to snap Sierra's knotted neck muscles. She gasped, grabbing her nape with one hand and clinging to the armrest with the other as the driver laid on the horn. No one had time to let out more than a startled curse before the bus swerved again, swaying top-heavily. "What the hell, lady?" someone behind Sierra demanded, but without answering the driver gunned the engine and swung left onto the median as if she intended to make a U-turn into the southbound lanes. Sierra's backpack tumbled to the floor and her shoulder slammed with bruising force against the window. Everyone seemed to be shouting as the bus tipped drunkenly back and forth. The horn blared incessantly, the air brakes barked and the bus abruptly heeled over past the point of no return. Shrieking, Sierra grabbed the headrest of the seat in front of her. With a concussive crump the bus rolled onto its side and skidded briefly across the grass in a strident tenor screech of chafing metal and breaking glass.

The subsequent stillness held neither quiet nor relief. Someone was groaning and someone else was swearing and a lot of people seemed to be crying and beneath all the noise rang a faint baying or cawing, like an echo of the bus's horn blasts in Sierra's numb ears. She realized then that she was the one groaning and tried to stop, but could only reduce the sound to a whimper.

_Ow. Ow, ow, ow ..._

Pain lanced down her neck as she turned her head, receding to a dull throb when she hastily checked the movement. Her arms and torso griped at the awkward posture into which she'd been forced, hanging sideways from her seat belt in mid-air, fingers still clamped around the headrest, hip grinding into an armrest. She tried to undo the belt's catch one-handed, but her trapezius muscles screamed at the strain and she fumbled her grip. Her second attempt was no more successful; a third left her gasping in agony.

_What's wrong with me?_

Fear whipsawed through her brain. _Oh, God, what if I can't get out? What if I hurt myself worse trying? _Her breath came faster and faster; darkness seethed at the edges of her field of vision. And then the window above her was thrown open and the cool air of a spring dawn broke over her face like water. Sierra carefully turned her head and drank it in. "Help," she croaked. Clearing her throat, she tried again. "Help!"

The weird cawing noise sounded louder now, more recognizably bird-like and most definitely coming from outside the bus. Before Sierra could make sense of it, however, a man with a narrow face and a receding hairline poked his head through the window. "You hurt?" he asked.

"Stuck," Sierra answered breathlessly. "My seat belt's stuck."

"Hang on, _mija."_ Bending down, the man studied her predicament for a moment, then stretched an arm past her. His elbow bumped her chest; she stiffened, but his fingers latched onto the buckle and released it. "There," he grunted as he withdrew.

Sierra wriggled off the armrest and dropped, still clutching the seat in front of her, until her feet found purchase on the bench across the aisle. "Thank you," she said, looking up at her rescuer. _"Gracias."_

The man grinned and offered her a hand up. Sierra pried the lower armrest of the bench on which she'd been trapped down to make a ladder and stepped onto it, bringing her chin level with the window. She was about to take the helping hand when something impossibly large swept down out of the sky and snatched it away, then landed with a heavy rattle and crunch on the far end of the bus. Instinctively ducking, she caught a glimpse of wide, oddly glittering wings and a pair of glowing golden eyes on either side of a long, cruel, slightly curved beak that shook her rescuer as an egret might its prey, then tossed his limp body aside.

The next thing Sierra knew she was crawling with desperate haste across seat backs toward the rear of the bus, breathing in keening gasps that almost, almost drowned out the hideous squawks of the monster outside. _Ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod!_ She clambered past and over several unmoving bodies before a vestigial sense of responsibility brought her up short. They needed help — first aid. She could help. She ought to be helping, but she couldn't think what to do. _Daddy, what am I supposed to do?_ Curling into a ball, she rocked in place. "I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!" she whispered into her knees.

The bus shook with a new impact. Sierra spun in place and saw a huge clawed foot rip a window out, frame and all. Screaming, she scrambled away as another monster-bird's beak reached into the bus to pluck at a bench. On her left a dim patch of light gleamed among the shadows; she veered toward it and realized that the brightness came from an open emergency exit in what had been the ceiling. She dove through headfirst, nearly landing on a woman who crouched, sobbing, in the shadow of the bus, a wailing child clasped to her breast. "Move!" Sierra shouted at them, but the woman simply stared at her.

Something drew Sierra's attention skyward. A baker's dozen of the monster-birds circled the fading moon, cackling loudly at one another like a murder of crows with bullhorns. The one roosting at the head of the bus shrilled up at them; in answer two more broke from the flock to dive toward the highway. Sierra threw her hands over her head and bolted for the verge. As her feet pounded across the tarmac she heard the stentorian blast of an air horn — a green and white semi had barreled around the curve a quarter mile away and was headed straight for her. She kept going, too short of breath to wail; the tractor-trailer dodged into the passing lane and the wind of its wake struck her body like a blow.

Sierra stumbled off the tarmac and limped away down the verge, gradually gathering speed again despite the twists of cramp in her calves and hamstrings. Behind her the truck's horn sounded once more, met by a scream of challenge from the monsters. The semi's brakes groaned in agony. A rending crash, a _fwoomp!_ of ignition — Sierra put her head down and forced her protesting body into a sprint, putting the curve and a man-high fold of worn rock between her and the mechanical carnage littering the interstate.

She didn't dare think of the people caught up in it.

Ahead the highway ran straight almost to the horizon before it bent out of sight behind a fir-dotted slope. On Sierra's left the verge dropped away into a deep but narrow ditch backed by a blue-green thicket of juniper bushes. Sierra hesitated momentarily as she wondered whether she should take to the brush and hide, but then what? She'd left her backpack behind on the bus; her jacket pockets were empty, both phone and wallet lost who knew where. All she had left was the fifty-dollar bill she'd tucked down her sock in Las Vegas and what good was that out here in the middle of nowhere? _Oh God, oh God, help me._ The clamor of the monster birds rose to a new crescendo, resounding off the dark heights, and panic drove Sierra's legs like pistons against the uneven ground, on and on and on until she tripped on a stone hidden in a tangle of weeds and sprawled prone against the chilly earth.

For a minute or two all she could do was lie there, winded and knocked half-silly by the impact. Then her ears caught the whirr of an oncoming engine and she pushed herself vertical, sniveling at the new sting of scrapes on her palms and knees. Snot clogged her nose; she swiped her sleeve across it and sniffled loudly as she wobbled to her feet. _Come on, slacker!_ she told herself in Coach Jo's voice. _Move it!_

The whirr deepened into a high-performance thrum as the car drove into view. Squinting in the half-light, Sierra made out a low-slung profile framing the approaching headlights. _Why couldn't you have been a pickup truck?_ she thought as she limped onto the shoulder and began waving. What she wanted — what she _needed_ right now was somebody's mom or dad, practical and dependable, not the kind of person who careered up the I-15 in an electric blue ... Lotus coupe? _Please, please, _please_ have more sense than money._ "Help!" she shouted. "Stop! Stop!"

The sports car slowed, then pulled to a halt beside her, cutting in so close that she rocked back on her heels and nearly fell again. "Hey, what's the trouble?" called the driver without bothering to roll down his window.

Sierra fought down a surge of anger at his behavior. "Please," she said, leaning with both hands on the glass, "please, you have to call 911!"

"Huh?" The driver seemed taken aback at her vehemence; the engine revved briefly, as if his foot had slipped on the gas pedal. "What happened? Were you in an accident?"

"Yes — no! The bus crashed, but — " Belatedly Sierra recognized the implausibility of her tale. Who would ever believe that gigantic birds were dive-bombing traffic in the mountains south of Provo? "I — I think it was attacked," she hedged.

"Attacked?" The driver's voice sharpened. "Who by?"

Sierra wished she could see him, but the windows were tinted and the windshield was dark with shadows behind the glare of the headlights. "I can't — you wouldn't — " She gulped back a sob, unshed tears burning at the corners of her eyes. "Please, _please_, just call 911! There's people hurt and, and in trouble — and a semi, too, and — "

"Okay, take it easy," replied the driver kindly — so kindly that Sierra was visited by the counterproductive urge to scream _I am NOT hysterical!_ right into his unseen face. Her hands clenched into fists. "Stay here," her interlocutor continued, oblivious to the effect of his tone. "I'll check it out."

"No! You can't!" Sierra's gut torqued with renewed fear and her head pounded as she fought for control of the emotional Tilt-a-Whirl her brain was riding. "It's too dangerous!" The car began to draw away and she hammered on the window, frantic to keep yet another would-be rescuer _( ... a shake and a snap, arms and legs flopping like a rag doll's ... )_ out of reach of the monsters _( ... bright eyes, gleaming wings, sharp beak stabbing down ... )_ "Please, you have to listen to me!" she screamed, jogging alongside the car as it picked up speed, snatching at a door handle that slipped through her bloodied fingertips.

"Stay here!" repeated the driver, his voice carrying easily over the burr of his engine as he upshifted. "And get under cover!" His tires keened, finding their grip on the road, and the car was gone, without even the odor of exhaust left behind to mark its passage.

Sierra stumbled to a stop on the lane marker. "Go on!" she yelled after him. "Go! Die already! See if I c-care — " She choked on a sob and bent over, hands braced on her thighs, caught between tears and nausea. The heaves won; she dropped to her knees and brought up a gritty, acrid mess of half-digested granola to decorate the pavement. _Go! Just go!_ She spat feebly to clear her mouth and her stomach lurched again, fouling her throat with acid. Coughing and wheezing, Sierra staggered upright, wiped her face on her jacket and took a few uneven steps southward. Someone else had to be coming — someone she could rely on —

Three booms pealed behind her in quick succession, too sharp for thunder, followed by a muffled burst of furious squawking. Sierra spun around, anxiously scanning the skies. Her heart raced as she realized how exposed she was. Why hadn't she taken the driver's advice and gotten out of sight? She scrambled down into the ditch as another series of booms rang out. Dead grass prickled against the exposed skin of her neck and knees as she pressed her body into the grade and peered cautiously over its lip.

The blue Lotus tore around the corner on the southbound side of the highway, weaving back and forth across the tarmac in a demented slalom explained by the pair of monster birds that arrowed after it. The long light of dawn tinted their glossy pinions blood-red, as if they were fledged with metal rather than feathers. Sierra's fingers dug convulsively through the dry grass stems into the hard-packed dirt beneath as she shrank away from the chase. In flight the creatures were even more terrifying than they had been perched within arm's reach, beaks cutting through the air like javelins, wings thrusting them forward with powerful strokes, their speed a promise that escape was hopeless.

What their presence didn't explain was the music.

She heard the machine-gun thud of the bass line first and thought that her ears were playing tricks on her. But then the unmistakable twang of a guitar joined the mix, strident and impulsive, followed by muffled voices belting out a rowdy melody: hard rock or metal, like the stuff that leaked from her brother's earphones while he was gaming. Sierra huffed out a disbelieving almost-laugh. _He needs a soundtrack?_

Then the birds stooped, spiraling around each other in a deadly dive. A shriek leaped into Sierra's throat and she bit down on one sleeve to contain it. The Lotus swerved into the median and the music rose to a fierce crescendo in which for the first time Sierra could discern words.

" — _WHEN SORROW SANG SOFTLY AND SWEET_ — "

Incredibly, the birds sheered off, screeching their frustration, their momentum carrying them past the Lotus and over a fold in the mountainside. The driver pivoted his vehicle into a donut, dust flying up from his wheels, and accelerated back into the northbound lane. Screeching to a stop just past Sierra's hiding place, the driver popped the Lotus's passenger door open. "Get in!" he urged over the cacophony blaring from his speakers. "Quick!"

Sierra hesitated only long enough to catch sigh of the birds rising up over the ridge line again. She scrabbled out of the ditch and flung herself into the car, its door slamming behind her as a pair of straps belted her in automatically. Beneath the throbbing pulse of bass and drums the engine rumbled aggressively as the car sped off up the highway. Wriggling her rumpled skirt back into place around her thighs, she turned to face her rescuer —

— and saw no one.

The driver's seat was empty.

Sierra was hardly aware that she was screaming until the music cut off; she was too busy tearing at the seat belts, throwing her whole weight against their inflexible webbing. "Whoa, whoa! Take it easy!" said the voice she had thought was the driver's. "You'll hurt yourself!"

"Let me out!" Sierra shouted. She yanked on the door latch, but it refused to yield to her grip any more than the seat belts had. "Let me out!"

"No can do," replied the voice. "You've seen what's out there, right?" The car swerved again, tossing Sierra from side to side in her restraints. She wheezed helplessly. "Sorry about that!" said the voice, itself sounding a little breathless.

"What — where are you?" Sierra gasped, clinging to the door handle for stability now. "Are you driving this car by remote control?"

"Uh —" The voice hesitated. "Would it make you feel better if I said yes?"

"You — you _jerk!"_ Sierra pounded left-handed on the dashboard, refusing to be impressed by its complex array of gauges and buttons or the high-def screen currently displaying a jagged, oscillating pattern like an EKG on fast-forward or a very busy seismogram. "This isn't funny!"

"Yow! I'll say!" retorted the voice. Sierra raised her fist again and he hastily added, "What's your name? Mine's Smokescreen."

"Sierra," Sierra answered automatically. _Wait, what?_ "'Smokescreen'?" she repeated. "Is that some kind of dorky gamertag? Who are you, really?"

"Hey, that's not nice!" the voice exclaimed. The stylized lion's face in the center of the steering wheel blinked blue in time with his words, Sierra noticed. It wasn't a logo she knew, neither the triangular Lotus monogram nor anything else she had ever seen at a race or a car show. "I don't make fun of your designa — whoa!"

Something zipped past Sierra's window; she flinched away instinctively as the car jinked. The steering wheel spun and centripetal force squeezed Sierra against the restraints across her chest and hips as they careened through a tight U-turn. "Sorry!" shouted the voice over a squeal of tires. Then he gunned it, pitching Sierra back into her seat and giving her a perfect view of the monster bird flying straight toward the windshield.

Sierra screamed again, but the sound was immediately overwhelmed by another salvo of heavy metal. "_THE AIR WAS FILLED WITH TEARS, FULL OF SADNESS AND GRIEF, WHEN SORROW SANG SOFTLY AND SWEET!_" wailed the chorus, so vociferously that her ears actually vibrated with pain. She shoved her fingers into them, trying to duck away from the din, and closed her eyes. "Make it stop!" she yelled, but could scarcely hear herself through the racket that seemed to strike her ribcage like rabbit punches. _"Make it stop!"_

It stopped, and when she dared to open her eyes, the bird was gone. "Sorry," the voice said again, sounding rather strained, though Sierra's ears were ringing so badly it was difficult to tell. "I don't understand how Bulkhead can listen to that stuff. My audials may never recover."

"What's going on?" Sierra asked weakly. "What are those things?"

"Predacons," said the voice — Smokescreen — with the same inflection tough guys in action movies used to say, _Trouble._ "Raf — uh, someone told me your Greek mythology calls this subspecies Stymphalian birds."

The window containing the fractal seismogram minimized, retreating to the upper left corner of the screen, and was replaced by a photograph of an orange and black pottery bowl decorated with a hunting scene. A large, dark-skinned figure in a complicated outfit was aiming a slingshot at a flock of not particularly massive or threatening birds that occupied most of the design. "A human hero named Heracles was sent to deal with an infestation of them in a forest near Lake Stymphalis in Arcadia," Smokescreen went on, suddenly more museum docent than action hero. "He's supposed to have driven them out with a bronze rattle he received from the gods." He paused thoughtfully. "Makes you wonder ... but, anyway, I figured they might be vulnerable to sonics and it looks like I'm right." His passing smugness dissipated in a sigh. "What I wouldn't give for that resonance blaster right about now ..."

Sierra stared at the screen, letting the half of his words which made no sense wash past her. Giant _mythological_ monster birds? Really? How was she supposed to believe that?

_You did see them._

All right, but she'd also just been in an accident. A bad one. Maybe she'd been knocked unconscious and was having the mother of all nightmares. Maybe the accident was even part of the nightmare. Sierra surreptitiously pinched her forearm and winced. As if all the scrapes and bruises and muscle aches she could feel weren't witness enough to the fact that she was awake. She shook her head — carefully, so as not to disturb the migraine lurking behind her eyes. "Look," she said, "can't we just call the National Guard or someone for help and get out of here?" Reaching forward, she tapped the Bluetooth emblem at the head of an otherwise unfamiliar list of symbols hovering in the right margin of the display. Instead of a dial tone, however, all she got was the restoration of the seismogram's window to its former position on the screen.

"Unfortunately, no — my comms are jammed but good," replied Smokescreen glumly. "I can't punch through the interference. Believe me, I've been trying." The waveform's jagged peaks contracted into a series of fuzzy beads, then expanded back to their previous height. "Somebody really doesn't want news of what's going on here to get out."

Sierra frowned. So the pattern was showing that they had no bars? Something about that didn't quite make sense, but she couldn't figure out what. "Okay," she said. "Then let's — I don't know — drive back down into the valley until you've got a clear signal and call from there?"

"And leave all those other humans to the Predacons?"

Smokescreen sounded horrified and for the first time since the bus had crashed, Sierra felt something other than fear or anger: shame. _But what else can I do?_ she thought defensively. _I'm not an action hero — for God's sake, I was running away from home because I couldn't hack it there anymore!_ Home, where all she'd had to worry about was the cheer squad falling apart and her best friend moving away and her parents maybe splitting up — trivial troubles compared to the situation she'd landed herself in trying to escape them. Irony was a bitch. "Then what do you suggest?" Sierra asked waspishly as the car swung through yet another U-turn, this one at least somewhat less acute than the doughnuts Smokescreen seemed so fond of. "We can't keep running in circles!"

As if in answer Smokescreen stomped hard on the gas and a brassy double cry shrilled out behind them. Sierra's heart stuttered in her chest. She craned her neck in a vain attempt to catch a glimpse of their pursuers in the side mirror, not daring to swivel around for a look behind. "I was trying to draw them all off, but they only sent those two scouts after me," Smokescreen said as the car shot toward the bend in the highway, behind which a plume of dark smoke stained the brightening sky. "I guess I'll just have to annoy them some more."

There was a note in his voice that reminded Sierra of Danny in prankster mode, a sort of sly glee. It should have exasperated her, but instead her mouth quirked into a half-smile. "I'm sure it's what you're best at," she said.

"Hey!" objected Smokescreen, sounding exactly like Danny, and Sierra's lips relaxed into the smile a little further.

They raced around the curve, back onto the scene of the disaster. The tractor-trailer lay overturned, blocking both northbound lanes, and its cab was burning lustily. Amusement fled, Sierra swallowed hard to dislodge the lump calcifying in her throat. Several more birds had come to roost on the bus and were yanking its frame apart, like turkey vultures tearing at the flesh of a dead deer. Others were attempting to do the same to the toppled trailer, their talons puncturing its sides and ripping great gouges in its panels. The remainder circled lazily above, bodies washed in the same rosy glow as the mountain peaks and the wisps of cloud around the moon.

But their heads all turned toward the oncoming car at a warning shriek from its chasers, eyes luminous with more than reflected sunlight.

A chill knifed through Sierra's belly at the sight of those eyes and her teeth chattered until she clamped her jaws tight. She remembered everything that had happened since she first saw them too clearly for it to have been a dream: the friendly hand wrenched away from hers, the arms and legs tumbled slack and still among the seats in the dark — oh, God, that lady clinging to her baby beside the emergency exit. Were they still waiting for rescue? Were their cries loud enough to keep the monsters off? Or had they been snapped up and shaken until they broke, too? Unconsciously Sierra leaned forward, bracing herself against the dash.

"Here we go!" said Smokescreen. "Hang on!"

* * *

**Author's Note:** _The alert reader may deduce the real-world location in which this chapter takes place. The truly alert reader will notice that I have taken liberties with the topography to suit the needs of my story (and believe me, it only gets worse in the next chapter). Fortunately, my artistic license is current. _

_This chapter is for Ron, who introduced me to Blind Guardian _("This won't make your head explode!")_ and his sister Karissa, who giggled at Smokescreen's vain attempt to make Sierra feel better._


End file.
